Privacy Statement

The SFIA Foundation is committed to creating a web site that is easy to use and is respectful of the users privacy. This privacy policy explains how we use information we collect about you and how you can instruct us if you prefer to limit the use of such information.

Need for personal information

Personally identifiable information is not required to obtain access to any part of our public sites, but if you choose to withhold such information where it is expressly required, we may not be able to:-

• give you access to certain sections of the site;
• process any order for learning materials or other product you have placed
• send you information you may have requested; or
• contact you.

Information gathered

We collect two types of information from you:-

• information you submit to us and
• information our site gathers automatically

Information you submit

If you wish, where available:-

• to access certain areas of the web site
• to purchase learning materials or other products
• to register your interest in any promotions, projects, services, competitions etc offered on the website
• us to contact you

We will normally require you to complete a registration form. Our registration form requires some basic information including contact information (name, address, and phone number), and payment information (if applicable) needed to process your order, register or enable us to contact you. There are also some non-required fields on our registration form that you may use to provide more data about yourself to help us serve you better.

By entering your details on any of the forms at www.sfia.org.uk, you hereby confirm that the SFIA Foundation may use such information for our internal business purposes including monitoring enquiries, compiling enquiry statistics and providing such information to any group company or sponsor of the SFIA Foundation. If you do not wish for your details to be used for this purpose you should not complete the registration details. Nothing in this section affects your rights under the Data Protection Act 1998.

When filling out a form on this website, if you  wish to be contacted by the SFIA Foundation about other services and information of potential interest and benefit to you and/or your organisation, you will be given the opportunity to tick the "opt-in" box provided at the end of each form.

Information our site gathers automatically

Usage tracking
We welcome everyone to search and use our site without charge to view the information and materials available for purchase or made available free of charge. As you browse our web site we may log your IP address (the Internet address of your computer not the e-mail address) and other standard tracking data to evaluate which parts of our site you visit and how long you stay there. This information is aggregated with tracking data from all site visitors to measure the number of visits, average time spent on the web site, pages viewed, etc.

We use aggregated information to help us evaluate the information, training materials and other products and services, including any new offerings we make available on our web site and to measure the use of our site and generally improve the content. Site use tracking data is never associated with individually identifiable information that would reveal anything personal about you.

Cookies
Like many other commercial web sites, the SFIA Foundation may use standard technology known as 'cookies' to collect information about how you use the site and to ensure that visits go smoothly, especially if you are placing an order for training materials or other product.

[Our cookies neither reveal nor contain any identifying or personal data. Cookies can't read any information on your computer or interact with other cookies on your hard drive.]

If you do not want your browser to accept cookies, you can turn off the cookie acceptance option in your browser settings. NOTE: Disabling cookie support will prevent this site from functioning properly and you may not be able to utilise fully all of its features and information.

Click through URLs
In some of our customer email communications, we may use a device called a "click-through URL." When you click on one of these URLs, you pass through our system before arriving at the web site that is your true destination. The SFIA Foundation uses click-throughs to determine the level of interest in particular topics and to measure the effectiveness of our communications. We do not share this data with anyone, and we make no attempt to match click-throughs to particular email addresses.

Use of information

We will only use any personally identifiable information to, where applicable:-

• process an order where online ordering is available - currently through the e-skills UK website
• register your interest in the SFIA Foundation learning materials and other products, projects, competitions, awards or services or SFIA Foundation offers
• improve our ability to serve you when you make an inquiry or request
• contact you where you have asked us to do so; and
• market our learning materials, products or services.
• provide ongoing monitoring or support in relation to any courses 

Order and dispatch of SFIA documentation is managed on behalf of the Foundation by e-skills UK. If you purchase products through the e-skills UK site we use your registration information to process your order(s) and to send you email about your orders. If you submit credit card information, we use that information to collect payment for your orders. e-skills UK uses encryption technology to attempt to protect your credit card details however e-skills UK can not guarantee that such technology is totally private or secure. If you would prefer to make payment by another method please contact us to discuss this aspect.

The information you provide or we obtain from you via the SFIA Foundation web site will be held primarily by the SFIA Foundation. You agree that we may show the information you provide to such of our employees as need to see it and, because the SFIA Foundation is sometimes funded by third parties in relation to specific projects or in connection with creating learning materials or in liaison with accreditation bodies we may send it to such persons. You agree we may also share you information with third parties engaged to assist in the processing of any order, or in relation to any courses run or any other services provided to you.

We may also provide individually identifiable information to third parties in any case where it is required by law.

It is the SFIA Foundation policy not to disclose any individually identifiable information about site users to third parties without specific permission to do so. We do not sell users' names or email addresses to other companies to use to send unsolicited advertisements or mail.

Third Party sites

Any third party display advertisements or links to third party sites shown on our site may collect user information if you click or follow their instructions. We do not control any data collected voluntarily or involuntarily through these advertisements or third party sites. You should investigate the privacy policies of any such site if you have concerns about its collection and use of user information.

Updating the privacy policy

The SFIA Foundation may update this Privacy Statement from time to time. Please check this page periodically for changes. Your continued use of the SFIA Foundation site following the posting of changes to this Statement means you accept the changes we make.  If you have any comments or questions regarding this Privacy Statement or site Terms, please contact us.